The current circulation of Ta Kung Pao newspaper is estimated to be 400,000 copies (in print), of which 160,000 copies are distributed in Hong Kong, 210,000 in Mainland China, and 30,000 for the rest of the world. The daily visits of Its online version is estimated to be 150,000.

Contents

In the final years of the Qing dynasty, Ying Lianzhi, a Catholic Manchu aristocrat, founded the newspaper in Tianjin on 17 June 1902, in order to, in Ying's own words, "help China become a modern and democratic nation". The paper put forward the slogan Four-No-ism" (四不主義) in its early years, pledging to say "No" to all political parties, governments, commercial companies, and persons.

It stood up to the repression at the time, openly criticizing the Empress Dowager Cixi and reactionary leaders, and promoted democratic reforms, pioneering the use of written vernacular Chinese (baihua). Readership fell after the Xinhai Revolution in 1911 and Wang Zhilong (王郅隆) bought it in 1916. Still, the newspaper was out of business by 1925 due to the lack of readership. On 1 September 1926, however, Wu Dingchang (吳鼎昌), Hu Zhengzhi (胡政之), and Zhang Jiluan (張季鸞) re-established the newspaper in Tianjin. With "no party affiliation, no political endorsement, no self-promotion, no ignorance" (不黨, 不賣, 不私, 不盲) as its motto, the newspaper's popularity quickly rose again because of its sharp political commentary, especially of the Japanese as the Second Sino-Japanese War began.

As the war raged on, the newspaper's staff fled to other cities, such as Shanghai, Hankou, Chongqing, Guilin and Hong Kong, to continue publishing, but local editions were abandoned as the Japanese captured more and more territory. After the war was won, Wong Wan San (王芸生), the chief editor, re-established the Shanghai edition on November 1, 1945, in the format and style of the old Shanghai edition. They had also planned to issue editions for other cities, including Guangzhou, but the Chinese Civil War forced this proposal to be shelved. Ta Kung Pao initially supported the Kuomintang during the Civil War, but switched its sympathies to the Communists after the repression of intellectuals, hyper-inflation, and other violent purges of political opponents by the Kuomintang.[3]

In March 1948, the Hong Kong edition was re-established. A major newspaper during the Republican years, it continued to be influential after re-publication by Fei Yi Ming, the subsequent publisher in Hong Kong after 1949, as one of few newspapers that survived foreign invasion and civil war. In April 1952, British authorities in Hong Kong tried the newspaper's proprietor, publisher, and its editor for violation of the Sedition Ordinance. Ta Kung Pao, along with the New Evening Post and Wen Wei Po were charged with inciting an uprising by negatively reporting on the colonial authorities' response to a fire in Tung Tau Tsuen. As a result, Ta Kung Pao's leadership was fined, jailed, and ordered to cease reporting for six months.[3]